Two thousands feminists and anti-fascists resisted ultra-conservative “March for Life” on Saturday
Over the past few years, the March for Life, led by ultra-conservative anti-abortion activists, has faced increasing blockades. Efforts to limit abortions by people like Radim Ucháč, Jakub Kříž, and Zdeňka Rybová have also met with increasing resistance in the Czech Republic. Last year, a coalition of feminist and left-wing collectives even managed to block the March for Life completely for the first time.
The Movement for Life has clearly learned its lesson this year and left nothing to chance. First, it sued the police for not taking more brutal action against anti-fascists. Unsuccessfully. Then the Movement tried to take over practically the entire centre of Prague so that there was not a single spot left where another demonstration could gather. This was successful in the Prague City Hall, which banned the feminists’ action, but not in court.
The police this year also certainly did not underestimate anything and deployed a large number of units of all kinds. Hundreds of heavily dressed people were running around the city. But the big March for Life did not pass through Prague. After the mass in St. Vitus Cathedral, the conservative marchers did not linger at all on Hradčany Square. They split into a number of small groups and walked along planned routes towards Wenceslas Square.
They wanted to make themselves practically unblockable, because there would be a lot of marches and they would be so small that they would easily mix with tourists and other passing people. In addition, they were accompanied by a number of police officers, who were often more numerous than in the small march of a few dozen people. This is how the Movement’s tactics ultimately partially worked. The vast majority of people managed to get from point A to point B. Although some only halfway through the official program. At the same time, the march itself did not pass through Prague at all.
Counter-demonstration
About two thousand people gathered at Republic Square at 11 a.m. on Saturday 11 April for a demonstration for women’s rights. After an hour and a half of speeches, rapping and singing, the official feminist event ended. Three large processions set off from here. “We are for life,” shouted anti-fascists with feminist banners. Each of these feminist marches had hundreds of participants and tried to block small groups of the Movement for Life. This was only partially successful.
When encountering a much larger crowd of blockers chanting slogans such as “Jesus would have walked with us” and “Her body, her choice”, small groups of ultra-conservatives usually simply left from elsewhere – accompanied by heavy-duty men. The contacts between the groups remained non-violent, with feminists always trying to simply outrun conservatives with balloons and chant. In any case, the number of people mobilised by the Prague is Feminist collective on the streets significantly exceeded the number of people marching against abortion.
Logically, everyone gradually reached Wenceslas Square, where they also met heavy-duty men and processions of blockaders. Heavy-duty men prevented anti-fascists from entering the square from all five adjacent streets. They also closed the subway underpasses and adjacent passages. In the meantime, they waited for groups of supporters of the Movement for Life to arrive, and they were the only ones allowed to continue along the corridor to the square. Despite this, they managed to block groups of conservatives in several places.
An anti-abortion event did eventually take place on Wenceslas Square. However, a few hundred counter-demonstrators entered through various passages and continued to chant persistently here. Hundreds of participants in the anti-abortion event listened to speeches and songs, to which chants of the feminist counter-action could be heard constantly. The counter-demonstrators eventually surrounded the Movement for Life event from several sides. According to Novinky, five people from among the blockaders were detained by the police during the day.
Machine translation
